Along the process of becoming photographer, I have searched for more efficient post-processing techniques that reduce my time in front of the computer while not reducing the quality of the final product.  There is of course a balance, for instance, in terms of breadth of job and the allotted time before the deadline [To use an extreme example - the task of editing 5,000 images in a week's time].

From trial and error more than anything else [though I have had some incredibly helpful pointers from my good friend Lauren Larsen along the way], I’ve developed the following system for editing a large-scale event like a wedding.  My portrait sessions at this point are of a smaller scale and don’t require as streamlined a workflow, so what I’m addressing here is only the coverage-based, more photojournalistic sorts — namely day events, and, specifically — weddings.

THE DAY OF THE EVENT

First things first.  I always shoot in Manual mode if the light of a scene is fairly controlled, but I will switch to Aperture-Priority if I am moving back and forth in different lighting situations.   The key is to shoot as much in manual as possible.  The more photographs I expose correctly in the camera, the less work I have to do at the computer repairing my mistakes.

I only shoot in RAW mode, and I use the sRGB colorspace as it seems to maintain accurate color in a variety of applications digitally but also in print.  I can’t afford the extra space JPEGs consume on my memory cards, especially in a fast-paced environment like wedding coverage.   Relatedly, the faster-paced the event, the more probable the light and the scenes are in flux and the photographer is required to adapt his exposures to appropriate the scene.  In this case I will miss a few stops in terms of exposure simply because of misjudging the light in the heat of the moment or because my finger slips a bit too far when setting the shutter speed.  Shooting in RAW allows me to correct these mistakes fairly well when I am looking at the frames on the computer screen.

AFTER THE EVENT

Immediately after the shoot is complete and I have made it back to my studio [which is a tricky name that, in my case, means my apartment living room], I immediately begin the process of uploading the files onto my computer.  I create a folder for the entire shoot and name it according to month, and sort it into a folder for the year pertinent.  For instance, I would name my most recent wedding very simply “11 Woodard-Dodgen Wedding” — “11″ meaning November, and “Woodard-Dodgen Wedding” denoting that the event photographed was, well, the Woodard-Dodgen Wedding.  I’d then drop that folder within a folder called “2008.”

[Folders of all photographs sorted first by year, then by month]

Inside 11 Woodard-Dodgen Wedding folder, I create folders assigned to the different episodes within the event, and number them chronologically.  That way I sort my RAW files in order that they occurred, and, since the lighting is usually [if only slightly] different in these different scenarios, this method of sorting will come in handy when I began to batch edit albums, since I want to keep every scene as a whole consistent in terms of my post-processing.

After uploading all files into the event folder and sorting them into the correct order based on the folders I’ve created, I use Adobe Bridge to batch rename all files in each folder with the same name as the folder and a serial number appendage so that they remain in the correct order chronologically.  I repeat this process for each folder in the event folder.

Once I’ve sorted all files into folders and effectively renamed them serially, I copy the entire event folder onto a separate hard drive to ensure I have all the RAW files in two locations.   I then return to the master [or, the original] folder, and rate images in Adobe Bridge according to how strong they are as images.  I usually end up picking ≤15% of the total frames I took that day.  This means I am fairly content if I got 150 “keeper” frames out of a batch totaling 1,000.   I usually end up with more — I just always try to provide a bottom line [with some elasticity] to provide for the client.

EDITING.  FINALLY.

Once I’ve rated the images, I edit the best ones — to which I usually will give special attention and thus extra time — in Adobe Camera Raw, removing vignetting, adjusting white balance, and correcting exposure if needed.

After this is done I will open them directly in Photoshop and put on the finishing touches.  The remaining files I edit batch in Adobe Camera Raw and remove vignetting, correct exposure and white balance, and batch process them via Photoshop into 16-bit TIFFs, applying an action I’ve written to warm them up a bit, add some contrast and saturation, and apply a final Unsharp Mask.  Once I’ve finished processing all the TIFFs, I use Bridge to process them to 8-bit JPEG for printing.  Bridge sorts these neatly into a folder called “JPEG” within the current directory, which is nice.

I then go through the JPEG folder and fix any images I’m not satisfied with, and if they aren’t great images I will delete them.   I go through this process with each folder in the entire event folder.  After I’ve repeated this process the appropriate amount of times, I go through the JPEG folder and run “Batch Rename” [Tools » Photoshop » Batch...] through Bridge again so that they are named nicely according to their folder and serially.  Each folder as a final result should look something like this [ignore the poor white balance]:

PROOFING AND PRINTING

When this entire process is done, I upload in batched the final JPEGs to my client proofing website [I currently use zenfolio.com] for easy access and viewing by clients.  From there they may select images they like for printing.

Once I’ve done that, I copy all JPEG folders into a “Burn Folder” via Mac OSX finder, and burn all full-size final JPEGs to the appropriate number of data DVDs, and ready them for packaging.

When the client has ordered their prints, I send the orders to WHCC.com, and when I receive the final prints in the mail I package them nicely and neatly with the DVDs of the digital negatives, and mail the entire package to the client.

Though the editing of images takes around 6 hours total, I give myself about 6-8 weeks total from the day of the shoot for the completion of the project and shipping to the client.  This ensures I have adequate time to edit the images well, receive input from client, and anticipate turnaround from the print vendor.  It also allows me to juggle multiple clients’ shoots at a time without reducing the quality of the final product.

CARE?  SHARE.

Like any system, there is work to be done and improvement to be made.  My whole purpose in posting this is to hear any suggestions and critiques you have.  My hope is that we can all share our processes as a community of photographers so that in the end each of us has a better-crafted, efficient system for producing a large number of professional-quality images in a small amount of time.